Image source: Newsrealblog.com

After the All American Muslim/Lowe’s fiasco I’m a little overwhelmed with television. I’ve read about a hundred blog posts about why reality television is the right forum for exploring islamophobia, and about a hundred posts about why it’s all wrong for the job. To summarize: reality television’s ubiquity makes it accessible, but it also cheapens human experience and sensationalizes real issues. Reality television isn’t real, it’s edited and produced. The image we see of a “normal” Muslim family is a product of our appetite for entertainment. This means, while it may do some good, it may also be exploitative and misleading.

I’m about as sick as a person can be of this particular controversy but it did make me start to think about how entertainment can be used for promoting healthy dialogue. Whilst researching that idea I came across a year-old quote from Katie Couric on the topic. Somehow I missed this insulting gem the first time around. Couric: “Maybe we need a Muslim version of The Cosby Show. I know that sounds crazy but The Cosby Show did so much to change the attitudes about African Americans in this country, and I think sometimes people are afraid of what they don’t understand.”

The fancy Huxtable family home:

Image source: Molecularshyness.wordpress.com

I’ve always felt slightly insulted by the cultural street cred the Cosby show enjoys. Yes, it’s great to have approachable public figures like Bill Cosby or Oprah Winfrey that create a positive public image for a minority, but when that image is manufactured it reflects a stereotype of safety. The Cosby Show is about a professional, black family. They’re rich, upper class, highly educated and decidedly bland. It’s no surprise that people felt like they could relate to the Huxtables—they were engineered to appeal to a general audience. The show stripped away African American culture leaving a digestible, starchy snack food of a show that made people feel good about their open mindedness.

I’m not sure a sitcom like that about a Muslim family would do anything but insult real Muslim families. Removing the controversial aspects of a culture may be great for promoting a safe public image but does it really serve the greater cause? I don’t want to cater to people’s prejudice by providing them with a simplistic and fake representation of reality.

Image source: Tvlistings.zap2it.com

Maybe I’m asking for too much. I just think the deep controversy over extremism, the history, the media firestorm, the pervasive prejudice, are all important parts of the Muslim American story. Maybe a show like All in the Family would be better—a show that makes fun of all the cultural baggage with a character we can love to hate. That’s something I’d watch.